


Resurrection

by Bloo (KiranInBlue)



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: F/F, Fluff, Heart-to-Heart, Mentions of Pregnancy, Trans Female Character, after the archdemon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-30
Updated: 2019-08-30
Packaged: 2020-09-30 16:05:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20449802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KiranInBlue/pseuds/Bloo
Summary: The Archdemon is defeated; the world is saved. Sigrun and Sereda have the chance to live their lives, but it's strange to live when you're meant to be dead.





	Resurrection

**Author's Note:**

  * For [1980sbusinesswoman](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=1980sbusinesswoman).

Sereda awakes with a start. She kicks, struggling to free herself from her bedroll, and when she disentagles herself, she lays flat on her back and breathes hard. 

“Wha…? Sereda?” 

Sigrun is stirring next to her, blinking blearily through the indigo shadows. 

Sereda forces her breath to even, and reaches out to touch Sigrun’s cheek. Her fingers linger on the brand, stark even in this darkness. 

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to wake you. I just startled myself. Go back to sleep.” 

“You sure?” Sigrun mumbles.

“Yes. I’m fine.” 

Sigrun closes her eyes and murmurs something that sounds halfway between an assent and a snore. The corner of Sereda’s mouth quirks upwards. 

When she’s certain Sigrun is asleep, Sereda carefully extricates herself from the bedding and crawls to the opening to the tent. The night air is a cool kiss against her skin, blessedly chasing away the last dregs of sleep. Sereda walks over to the dying embers of the campfire and settles herself on the ground there, close enough for her foot to touch the rocks lining the pit. She can feel the warm breath of the coals against her ankle, and as she watches, a stray spark escapes the smouldering remains and darts into the sky like a firefly. 

Sereda folds her arms and rests her chin against her wrist. 

Another nightmare. Not a darkspawn Calling-type nightmare, though. Those dreams are gone for good. No, this is just a regular run-of-the-mill, seen-too-much type of bad dream. Sereda looks into the glowing coals and breathes. 

They need to be up and moving early in the morning, and she knows she’ll need to be rested; she should try to get some sleep. But when she closes her eyes right now, she knows she’ll see death and smell blood and hear screams. Maybe she’ll give herself five minutes before she tries again. Perhaps ten. 

She’s not even sure what the dream was about, exactly. The images are blurry, indistinct. She just remembers the cutting sense of horror, despair, the absolute certainty that she was about to die. And then she’d been jerking awake in her tent, breathing hard but very much alive. 

Sereda’s hand wanders to her belly, where she presses gently against the soft swell there. 

Very much alive. 

She looks up, where the stars sprawl out across the night sky. Looking at the stars -- or the sky in general, really -- gives her the same kind of vertigo as reflecting on her continued survival does. She was never meant to be here. Sereda was born to the Stone, in the strong embrace of mountain and rock. She was born to be an Aeducan, to lead and play the politics game in the heat and bustle of Orzammar. And then . . . she was meant to die. First in the Deep Roads, then by the Archdemon. Maybe a hundred times in between as well. 

And yet she is here. She’s not in Orzammar. She’s not dead. She’s not even _ dying _anymore. With each ‘meant to’ she’s somehow broken, she’s found herself further and further from any path she recognizes. And yet, more paths branch out in front of her, new and alien. When she reflects on her life, it’s like looking at the stars: wide, vast, incomprehensible, and nothing she’d ever expected to see. 

There’s a rustle and a soft pad of footsteps behind her. When Sereda turns around, she sees Sigrun there, the last glows of the embers casting long shadows across her face. 

“Hey,” Sigrun says, giving her a sleepy wave. “Nice evening.”

Sereda smiles. _ All the better now. _“Yeah. It is.” 

Sigrun comes over and settles herself next to Sereda, leaning back on her hands. Sleep is still heavy in her expression, but her eyes are bright, attentive. “So. What’s going on? And don’t tell me nothing. You wouldn’t be out here if it were.” 

“How do you know I didn’t just need to take a leak?” 

“You didn’t.” 

Sereda laughs softly. “Yeah, you’re right. But it’s really nothing important. I just had a nightmare.” 

“Hmm. I know a thing or two about those.” Sigrun shifts, so that her head is resting on Sereda’s arm, and she looks into the smoldering coals. “Do you want to tell me about it?” 

“I don’t know that there’s much to tell. I don’t even really remember it. Just that there was a lot of fighting and people dying.” 

“Yeah, that sounds about right.” 

They lapse into silence. A log pops; around the clearing, they can hear the constant, high hum of crickets and frogs. 

“You should go back to sleep,” Sereda comments. 

“Eh. It’s too cold without my living furnace,” Sigrun counters. 

Sereda chuckles, carding her fingers through Sigrun’s loose hair. “...That’s what I was thinking about, you know. Being alive.” 

“Oh yeah? As opposed to being an animated corpse?” 

“Something to that effect.” 

Sigrun tilts her head, so that even while resting against Sereda’s arm, she can look into her face. Gently now, a little less humor in her tone, she says: “Well, I certainly appreciate not being an animated corpse. Your thoughts?” 

Sereda shifts her arm to drape it across Sigrun’s shoulders. “It’s pretty damn crazy we’re alive, isn’t it? Sometimes, I feel like we’ve somehow cheated the Stone. Or that, ancestors, somewhere along the line we _ didn’t _make it out, and this is all some weird post-death hallucination. Except you have to be alive to have hallucinations.” 

“As far as we know,” Sigrun agrees. “But. Yeah. I get that.” 

“But we are alive.” 

“Yeah.” 

“Does it ever feel unreal to you?”

“Yeah.” Now, Sigrun sits up. Sereda’s arm falls off her shoulders as Sigrun leans forward. She stares at the glowing embers as another log cracks and several sparks escape. “I guess I’ve spent so much time thinking of myself as dead already that it’s kind of hard to break the habit now.”

Sereda nods. She may have never been part of the Legion of the Dead, but she’s had poison in her veins, poison she was never meant to recover from. “What do you think we are going to do now?”

“Uh, specifically? Make our way out to that middle of nowhere we picked out on the map. Build a house. Be grossly happy together.” 

“Yeah,” Sereda says, with a breath of laughter. “But none of this, what we have now, was anything anyone meant for us to have. We left the tunnel entirely; we built a new path. What comes next is both completely undecided and totally up to us. We’re _ alive _. That’s crazy.” 

Sigrun laughs. “Yeah, it is.”

“We have the freedom to forge our own way.” 

“Freedom is a word meant for surfacers,” Sigrun comments wryly. 

The corner of Sereda’s lips quirk. “Well, we’re surfacers now.” The word feels odd in her mouth. Not bad, exactly. And not exhilarating either. New. It tastes like anticipation. 

And Sigrun chuckles. “Yeah. We’re surfacers.” 

“We have the freedom to do whatever we like. Ancestors, we even have the freedom to rest.” 

“‘Rest’,” Sigrun echoes, with a small shake of her head. “Another word that was never in the stories my mother told me when I was a kid.” 

“Well, we’ve earned it.”

“So many times over,” Sigrun agrees. She sits back. “Well, I can think of one thing I _ know _we’re going to do with our freedom.” One hand finds Sereda’s stomach, and her eyes twinkle in the glow of the fire. “We’re sure as heck gonna love this little rascal when they’re born.” 

Sereda smiles back, one hand coming down to cover Sigrun’s. “Yes, we will.” 

She turns her gaze back toward the star-strewn sky and breathes. The peace of the moment is settling on her, chasing away the tension wound tight in her limbs since the dream. But as she relaxes, the draining tension makes way for a bone-deep weariness to set in. 

Her thumb runs across the back of Sigrun’s hand, feeling the callouses and worn skin there. 

They’re alive. They made it out. But they didn’t make it out unscathed. They’re beaten and bruised and broken and put back together, but not in exactly the same way they once were. Sereda looks into Sigrun’s face, mapping the lines and scars and brands. 

So much they’re carrying with them. Sereda knows they can never put it all down, but she wonders if it will ever feel any lighter. 

Sigrun perhaps sees her expression shift, because she tilts her head as she considers Sereda. Sereda offers her a small, tight smile, then draws her hand up Sigrun’s arm to pull her into a tight embrace. Following the movement, Sigrun tucks her head against the crook of Sereda’s neck, and her hands come up to wrap around Sereda’s shoulders. She squeezes, holding Sereda tightly to her. 

They stay just like that for a long time. Sereda runs her hands up and down Sigrun’s back, just feeling her form against her. 

“I love you,” Sereda murmurs finally, Sigrun’s hair tickling her lips as she speaks. 

“I love you too.” Sigrun sits back and runs one hand gently over the side of Sereda’s face. “Want to tell me what that was about?” 

Sereda gives a little shrug. “I am just very glad you’re here. That we’re here.” 

“I hear that.” 

Sigrun settles herself down, pressed up against Sereda’s side. Sereda lets one arm wrap around Sigrun’s shoulders, holding her there. The night chill is settling in on them now, seeping into their skin. As Sereda runs her hand over the uppers of Sigrun’s arm, she feels the prickle of goosebumps. 

“We should go back to bed,” Sereda says finally. 

“Are you coming as well?” Sigrun asks. 

“Yeah.” 

“Then okay.” 

Pine needles crinkle underfoot as Sigrun pulls herself upright. She reaches down to Sereda. Sereda takes her hand, and Sigrun pulls her up. Still hand in hand, they make their way back to the tent. 

They climb back into their bedrolls. The fabric has cooled somewhat during their conversation, but it’s still warm enough to pull a soft sigh of appreciation from Sereda’s lips. When she’s settled, she reaches out finds the curve of Sigrun’s side. Sigrun rolls toward her. 

“You good now?” 

“I believe so,” Sereda says. And, indeed, when she closes her eyes, she doesn’t see the fires and destruction from her nightmare. 

There’s a rustle as Sigrun leans over to press a kiss to her lips. 

“Good,” Sigrun murmurs. “You have any more bad dreams, wake me.” 

“Only if you do the same.” 

Sigrun exhales a breathy laugh. “It’s a deal.” 

They settle into a silence that’s broken only by the soft rustle of breath over fabric and the persistent chirping hum of crickets outside the tent. Sereda pulls her arm back from Sigrun’s side so as to not trap her, but leaves her hand just barely kissing Sigrun’s back. 

She exhales. 

Inhales.

Exhales. 

It’s a strange place to be, this space between the stone and the stars. Yet they’re _ here_. Even as sleep begins to creep in around her consciousness, Sereda lets her mind dwell on the vertigo of freedom. They’re at the cusp of a universe they were never meant to know. The world has taken much from both of them, but now they are going to take from the world what _ they _need. 

They get to make their path. They get to define its edges and branches. They will rest. They will create. They will be more than a duster and an Aeducan, more than a Legionnaire and a Warden. They will _ be_.

As Sereda slips into sleep, she is lulled to peace by this mundane miracle of being alive. 

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this as part of ao3tagoftheday's fic drive to support the migrants being held in detention centers in the United States. 1980sbusinesswoman was incredibly kind to commission me for this fic, and it was such a delight working with their Aeducan! Thank you so, so much!


End file.
